Pawing Through the Past

by Rita Mae Brown

  “In my dumpster!” He wrung his hands.

  Tucker, as close to the dumpster as she could get without being in the way, asked Pewter, “What did the body look like when you first could see in?”

  Pewter peered down from the limb of the pin oak where she was reposing. She wanted a different view than Mrs. Murphy. “Leo’s mouth was open and so were his eyes. He’d stiffened up but it wasn’t too bad yet. They’ll have a hell of a time getting him out of there now.”

  “What I meant was, can you see how he was killed?” the dog persisted.

  “Right between the eyes. Like Charlie Ashcraft,” Pewter informed her with some relish.

  “Flies are what made the humans sick.” Murphy watched intently. “They’re in the dumpster so they crawled all over him but really, it could have been worse. He’s not been dead half a day.” She was matter-of-fact about these matters, but then, cats are.

  Rick and Cynthia, having finished their work, had to turn to Jim Sanburne, the crowd growing by the minute behind the yellow tape. “Jim, I prefer they leave but I doubt they will so keep them back. If they break through the tape they may compromise evidence. Can you call in anyone to help you?”

  Tracy stepped forward. “Sheriff, Tracy Raz, I can help.”

  Tracy was off in the service when Rick was young so he didn’t remember him, but he knew the Raz name. “Thank you.”

  “I’ll help, too.” Fair towered over the other two men.

  Tracy, accustomed to command, faced the murmuring crowd, some with handkerchiefs to their mouths. “Folks, I know this is extremely upsetting to you all but please leave. The more of us that crowd around, the more possibility that valuable evidence will be destroyed. Sheriff Shaw is doing all he can right now and he needs your help.”

  “Come on, gang.” Fair gently shepherded his friends and neighbors back down the alleyway.

  As people walked slowly they turned to see what else was happening. The last thing they saw was a big blue truck, Batten Services, come down the lane with Joe Batten emerging, his assistant and cousin, Harvey Batten, along with him. He ran the trash-removal company and he was going to take off the door to the dumpster so they could remove the body.

  “You girls go back into the post office,” Tracy soothingly directed, “because that’s where people will gather and they’ll need you to keep your heads.”

  “Quite right.” Miranda nodded. Violent death shocked her. But she’d seen enough death in her life to accept it as inevitable, although she never could accept violence.

  The cats and dog stayed at the scene of the crime. No one paid attention to them because they were careful to stay out of the way, even though Mrs. Murphy brazenly sat on top of Rick’s squad car.

  Joe glanced at the body, pulled a heavy wrench from his leather tool belt around his waist, and started turning a nut. “Harvey, you crippled?”

  Harvey swallowed hard, walked over, and crouched down to work on the bottom bolt. He was eye-level with the loafers on the corpse but he did not look inside.

  As the men worked, Diana Robb and the rescue squad crept down the alleyway, clogged with cars. The people moved away but they’d left their cars.

  Diana hopped out, marched up to the opened dumpster, and peered inside. “Like Charlie. Powder burns.”

  “Uh-huh,” Rick noncommittally grunted.

  “You ready for us?” She noticed the crushed green and orange 7 Up cartons under the body.

  “Yeah, you can take him.” Rick leaned against the squad car to light a cigarette.

  “Those things will kill you,” Mrs. Murphy scolded.

  He looked up at the cat looking down at him. “You don’t miss a thing, do you?”

  “Nope.”

  “Need a hand?” Tracy offered.

  “We’ve got it, thanks.” Diana smiled.

  Tracy asked Rick, “If you don’t need me anymore I’ll be going.”

  “Where to?”

  “The post office.”

  “I mean, where do you come from?” Rick inhaled.

  Tracy briefly filled the sheriff in on his background. “Retired now. Came back to help with our high-school reunion.”

  Rick reached out to shake his hand. “Rick Shaw, sheriff.”

  “Deputy Cynthia Cooper.” She shook Tracy’s hand also, as did Fair.

  “I’m renting rooms at Harry’s farm. If you need me I’ll be there.” He opened the back door to the post office, slipping inside.

  Fair, face white with upset, hands in jeans pockets, said, “Quite an ending for someone as fastidious as Leo Burkey. To be dumped with garbage.”

  “Harry made a similar comment,” Rick noted.

  Market bustled back again. “Sheriff, I hope you don’t think I did this. I couldn’t stand Leo, but I wouldn’t kill him. Besides, he lived far enough away he didn’t work on my mood.” Market’s voice was tremulous, his hands were shaking.

  “Market.” Rick paused. “Why didn’t you like him?”

  “Smart-ass. In high school—well, always.”

  “Yes, he was,” Fair confirmed.

  “As bad as Charlie Ashcraft?” Cynthia watched as Joe and Harvey lifted the blue metal door off its hinges, leaning it up against the side of the dumpster.

  “What’s worse, reaching in the garbage or picking up the body?” Pewter giggled.

  Tucker whirled around, hearing before the rest of them. “What’s worse is here comes Channel 29.”

  Diana, now seeing the van with the dish on top, as she was looking down the alleyway, urged, “Come on, let’s get him out of here and in a body bag before they jump out with the damned cameras.”

  Too late. Even before the van pulled over the cameraman was running toward them.

  “Stand back!” Rick barked, holding up his hand.

  A brief argument followed but the cameraman and on-air reporter did stay twenty yards back as Diana, with three assistants, lifted out the body. Since rigor was taking over, getting him into a body bag required effort.

  “Why don’t they break his arms and legs?” Pewter sensibly suggested.

  “They’d pass out. Humans are touchy about their dead.” Mrs. Murphy noticed the outline of his wallet in his back pocket. It would appear robbery wasn’t the motive.

  Market returned to the question Cynthia had posed before they were interrupted by the television crew. “No, Leo wasn’t as bad as Charlie Ashcraft. Charlie was in a class by himself. Leo wanted us to think he was a ladies’ man but he was more bark than bite. He had a smart mouth, that’s all. Hurt a lot of feelings. Or I should say he hurt mine. And he was handsome, I couldn’t compete with him for the girls. Not too many of us could.” He looked up at Fair. “Like you, the class ahead. You always got the girls.”

  “Hope I didn’t have a smart mouth.” Fair still watched fix-edly as they struggled with the body.

  “You were a good guy. Still are,” Market said. He leaned against the car with Rick, as he couldn’t stop shaking. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I feel dizzy.”

  “The shock of it.” Rick patted Market on the back. “No one expects to come to work in the morning and find a dead body in the garbage.”

  “If I’d kept those old garbage cans it wouldn’t have happened,” Market moaned. “That will teach me to leave well enough alone.”

  “Until they scattered all over the alleyway again,” Fair reminded him. “You did the right thing. Someone took advantage of it, that’s all.”

  “Someone who doesn’t much care about how they dispose of bodies. Two men, same age, same high-school class, shot between the eyes and left for the world to see. There’s a message here.” Mrs. Murphy walked over the back window, careful not to smear paw prints on it. “Like those stupid mailings. I think the message will get more clear in time.”

  “Both senior superlatives, too.” Pewter backed down the tree to join her friend. “That’s odd.”

  “Mom’s a senior superlative.” Tucker barked so loud she distracted one of
the rescue-squad men and he tripped, then righted himself.

  “We know,” the cats said. Then Murphy continued, “But so far the murdered are handsome men, well-off. Don’t panic yet.”

  “I’m not panicking,” the dog grumbled, “only observing.”

  “They say that when someone dies their features relax.” Pewter walked toward the post office, her friends walking with her. “But Leo Burkey looked surprised, like a bear had jumped out at him, like something totally out of the blue had shocked him.”

  “We didn’t see Charlie but it’s a sure bet he was surprised, too.” Tucker pushed through the animal door into the post office.

  Mrs. Murphy sat in front of the door, irritating Tucker who stuck her head back through to see where the cats were. “There’s human intelligence to this. That’s the trick, you see. Killers often start from an irrational premise and then are completely rational and logical when they act.”

  * * *

  24

  Glad to be home after an extremely upsetting day, Harry wearily pushed open the screened porch door. It didn’t squeak. She noted the hinges had been oiled. She heard pounding behind the barn.

  Mrs. Hogendobber had given her freshly baked corn bread in a square pan which the older woman had thoughtfully covered with tinfoil. Harry placed the pan inside the refrigerator.

  “Look!” Pewter trilled.

  Mrs. Murphy, whiskers swept forward, bounded up to Pewter in front of the refrigerator. Tucker ran over, too, her claws hitting the heart pine floorboards with clicks.

  “Wow, this is a first,” Tucker exclaimed.

  Harry grinned. “Hasn’t been this full since Mom was alive.”

  Milk, half-and-half, bottled water, and Dortmunder beer filled the beverage shelf. Chicken and steak, wrapped in cellophane, rested on another shelf. Fresh lettuce, collard greens, pattypan squash, and perfectly round cherry tomatoes spilled over the vegetable compartment. On the bottom shelf, neatly placed side by side, gleamed red cans of real Coca-Cola.

  Stacked next to the refrigerator were a variety of cat and dog canned foods with a few small gourmet packs on top.

  “A cornucopia of delight.” Pewter flopped on her side, rolling over then rolling back in the other direction.

  “He must be rich to buy so much food at once.” Tucker admired the canned food, too.

  “It is amazing.” Murphy purred, too, excited by the sight of all those goodies.

  Harry closed the door, turned to wash her hands in the sink, and noticed her yearbook and a 1950 yearbook resting on the table side by side. She opened the 1950 yearbook and saw Tracy’s name in youthful script in the upper right-hand page. Strips of paper marked her yearbook. She flipped open to each one. Tracy had marked all the photographs in which Charlie Ashcraft and Leo Burkey appeared.

  She closed the book and walked outside toward the sound of the pounding.

  Tracy, shirt off, replaced worn fence boards with good, pressure-treated oak boards, piled neatly in one paddock.

  “Tracy, you must be a good fairy or whatever the male version is.” She smiled.

  He pushed back his cowboy hat. “Oak lasts longer.”

  “Please give me the bill for the wood and the groceries. Otherwise, I’ll feel like I’m taking advantage of you.”

  “I love for women to take advantage of me.” He laughed. “Besides, you don’t know how good it feels to be doing something. Bet the post office was wild today, wasn’t it?”

  She knew he’d changed the subject because he didn’t want to hear anything more about repayment. “Yes.”

  “Damn fool thing. I read through your yearbook. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “No.”

  “Dead bodies don’t bother me. Got used to that in Korea. But wanton killing, that bothers me.”

  “Me, too. Can’t make rhyme or reason of this.”

  “Patience.” He lifted another board, she grabbed the far end to help.

  “What’s that expression, ‘Grant me patience, Lord, but hurry.’ I recall Mom saying that a lot.” She stepped to the side, nearly stepping on Tucker, who jumped sideways. “Sorry, Tucker.”

  “Cutest dog.”

  “Thank you.” Tucker cocked her head at Tracy.

  “Being all over the map, I couldn’t keep a dog. Li had one. Well, I guess it was mine, too, but since I was on the road so much it was really hers. Beautiful German shepherd. Smart, too. I knew as long as Bruno was with her, she was safe. You know, two weeks after Li died, Bruno closed his eyes and died, too. Granted he was old by then but I believe his heart was broken.” Tracy’s eyes clouded over.

  “I couldn’t live without Mom.” Tucker put her head on her paws.

  The cats listened to this with some interest but neither one would admit to such excessive devotion. The truth was, if anything ever happened to Harry, Mrs. Murphy would be devastated and Pewter . . . well, Pewter would be discomfited.

  Harry stooped down to pat Tucker’s head, since she was whining. “When I was little Mom and Dad had a German shepherd named King. Wonderful dog. He lived to be twenty-one. Back then we had cattle, polled Herefords and some horned Herefords, too, and Dad used King to bring in the cattle. Mom always had a corgi—those dogs herd as efficiently as shepherds. Someday I’d like to get another shepherd but only when I’m certain a puppy won’t upset Tucker and the kitties. They might be jealous.”

  “A puppy! I’ll scratch its eyes out,” Pewter hissed.

  “No, you won’t. You’ll hop up on the table or chairs. You like babies as much as I do.” Murphy laughed at the gray blowhard.

  “No, I don’t and I don’t recall you liking puppies or kittens that much. I recall you telling those two kittens of Blair Bainbridge’s ghost stories that scared the wits out of them.”

  Murphy giggled. “They grew up into big healthy girls. Of course, we hardly see them since they spend half their life at the grooming parlor.”

  Harry lifted another board. She and Tracy were getting into a rhythm. “Corgis are amazing dogs. Very brave and intelligent. Tee Tucker’s a Pembroke—no tail. The Cardigans have tails and to my eye look a little longer than the Pembrokes. Pound for pound, a corgi is a lot of dog.” She bragged a touch on the breed, a common trait among corgi owners.

  “I noticed when I came out back this morning—back of Market’s, I mean—that Pewter was in a tree. She could see everything. Mrs. Murphy sat on the squad car. She, too, could see everything, as well as hear the squad radio calls. And Tucker sat just off to the side of the dumpster door. Her nose was straight in the air so she smelled everything. Miranda said it was the animals that called attention to the dumpster.”

  “I did.” Tucker puffed out her white chest.

  “True, you have the best nose. I’d bet you against a bloodhound.” Mrs. Murphy praised the dog.

  “Don’t get carried away,” Pewter dryly said to the tiger.

  “Chatty, aren’t they?” Tracy pounded in nails.

  “You sure notice everything.”

  “That’s my training. I noticed something else, too. When they pulled the body out of the dumpster there was a stain across the seat of his pants, noticeable, like a crease. The killer sat him on the edge of the dumpster before pushing him back into it. As Leo was a big man and as the crease was pronounced, he sat there for a minute or two at the least before the killer could maneuver the body into the dumpster and close the lid. That’s what I surmise. Can’t prove a thing, of course. And I asked Miranda if she heard a car back there but her bedroom is away from the alley side of the house. She said she heard nothing. I would assume, also, that the killer was smart enough to turn off his headlights and that Leo Burkey’s car will turn up somewhere.”

  Harry stepped aside as he nailed in the last of the boards. He’d also brought out the fence stain so he could stain them right away. She counted twenty-seven boards that he’d replaced.

  “I’ll get another brush.” She walked to the toolshed where she kept brushes of every shape and si
ze, all of them cleaned and hung, brush side down, on nails. Harry never threw out a paintbrush in her life. By the time she returned he’d already painted one panel.

  “It’s not going to look right with some freshly painted and the others faded so I’m going to do the whole thing. Now you don’t have to work with me. After all, this was my idea, not yours.”